Offensive line goes from worst to first: a look at the advanced stats

The Patriots offensive crisis through the first few weeks of the season was massively overblown. As soon as the Garoppolo in for Brady whispers started swirling, any sort of rationalism was dashed. One thing that was very real throughout that four week period starting in week one was the horrifying offensive line play. The Patriots O-Line ranked 31st, 7th, 29th and 24th (of 26 in week four). The following four weeks - beginning with the Cincinnati game - ranked the O-line: 6th, 7th against the Bills , 21st against the Jets, and finally 1st against the Bears. There has been a common thread amongst the higher-ranked games.

The Patriots finally seem to have found a unit that works, after weeks of shuffling and waiting for full health. When the protection reads Solder - Connolly - Stork - Wendell - Vollmer, Brady has been able to sit back and carve defenses to shreds. He has finally been allowed the time to wait for receivers to get open downfield rather than hitting Edelman on almost all throws for short gains out of necessity. Tim Wright and LaFell have lit up the team, while Gronkowski is back on top of TEs in the NFL (move over Julius Thomas). Despite all the success, this offensive line unit is a fragile group, which was proven against the Jets.

The Pats started this lineup against the Bears and all was well. Quite comedically, the only hit that the offensive line allowed all day was the Lamarr Houston sack on Brady, which resulted in him tearing his ACL while celebrating despite being eliminated from the contest long before. Only two hurries were allowed, resulting in a pass-blocking efficiency rating of 94.2. Denver's O-line was second this week with a score of 91.4.

However, against the Jets, both Bryan Stork and Dan Connolly were ailing with concussions. Jordan Devey and Josh Kline were gifted with heavy snap counts (both played 60 at the respective guard slots), and it resulted in some horrible efficiency. Devey was responsible for two penalties and allowed 3 QB hits. He ranked 48th of 51 guards who played that week, with Kline ranked 42.

The point to take from this is that the Patriots offensive line has no depth whatsoever. If even one of the starters goes down, there is a strong chance that the offensive line will be catastrophic, purely because of the awfulness of the backups. It sounds harsh, but the numbers speak for themselves. In games where either Devey or Kline have started in place of an injured player or due to another lineman sliding to another spot, the offensive line has been awful. The only hope is to pray for miraculous health through the rest of the season and allow only Marcus Cannon to leave the bench.

Follow me on Twitter @ThorntonStuart

Read more of my work here